Argentine president to appeal to UN over Falklands

Argentine President Cristina Fernandez Kirchner has said her country would
register a formal complaint in the United Nations for what she called
Britain's "militarisation" of the South Atlantic and the Falkland
Islands.

9:25AM GMT 08 Feb 2012

Mrs Kirchner called the UK's recent actions to deploy its most powerful warship to the region was a threat to international security.

Speaking in front of a map of the Falkland Islandspainted with the Argentine flag, she criticised the deployment of destroyer HMS Dauntless and of Prince William in his role as search and rescue pilot to the area.

"It is a regional and global issue, because they [the British] are militarising the South Atlantic, one more time. Try as we may, we can't interpret it any other way. They are sending a destroyer... along with the heir to the throne. We would have liked to have seen him in civilian clothes, not in a military uniform," she said.

"That is why I've asked the foreign minister to make a formal presentation to the UN Security Council and also to the UN General Assembly that militarisation of the South Atlantic implies a grave risk for international security," she added.

Three decades on, memories of the war remain painful in Argentina, where most people see the decision by Argentinato land in the islands on April 2, 1982 as a mistake by the discredited military dictatorship ruling at the time. Nonetheless, many in Argentina are fervent about the country's claim to the islands.